"Those who don't know history are destined to repeat it."
Edmund Burke. What happened on this Day in History?

Monday, June 25, 2012

This day in History: Jun 25, 1950: Korean War begins

Armed forces from communist North Korea smash into South Korea, setting off the Korean War. The United States,
acting under the auspices of the United Nations, quickly sprang to the
defense of South Korea and fought a bloody and frustrating war for the
next three years.

Korea, a former Japanese possession, had been divided into zones of occupation following World War II.
U.S. forces accepted the surrender of Japanese forces in southern
Korea, while Soviet forces did the same in northern Korea. Like in
Germany, however, the "temporary" division soon became permanent. The
Soviets assisted in the establishment of a communist regime in North
Korea, while the United States became the main source of financial and
military support for South Korea.

On June 25, 1950, North Korean
forces surprised the South Korean army (and the small U.S. force
stationed in the country), and quickly headed toward the capital city of
Seoul. The United States responded by pushing a resolution through the
U.N.'s Security Council calling for military assistance to South Korea.
(Russia was not present to veto the action as it was boycotting the
Security Council at the time.) With this resolution in hand, President
Harry S. Truman rapidly dispatched U.S. land, air, and sea forces to
Korea to engage in what he termed a "police action." The American
intervention turned the tide, and U.S. and South Korean forces marched
into North Korea. This action, however, prompted the massive
intervention of communist Chinese forces in late 1950. The war in Korea
subsequently bogged down into a bloody stalemate. In 1953, the United
States and North Korea signed a cease-fire that ended the conflict. The
cease-fire agreement also resulted in the continued division of North
and South Korea at just about the same geographical point as before the
conflict.

The Korean War was the first "hot" war of the Cold War.
Over 55,000 American troops were killed in the conflict. Korea was the
first "limited war," one in which the U.S. aim was not the complete and
total defeat of the enemy, but rather the "limited" goal of protecting
South Korea. For the U.S. government, such an approach was the only
rational option in order to avoid a third world war and to keep from
stretching finite American resources too thinly around the globe. It
proved to be a frustrating experience for the American people, who were
used to the kind of total victory that had been achieved in World War
II. The public found the concept of limited war difficult to understand
or support and the Korean War never really gained popular support.